How much carbon dioxide do rainforests remove from the atmosphere?

Answer 1

It depends upon the age of the forest, old forests do not absorb any extra CO2 from the atmosphere. Replanting a forest will only reabsorb the CO2 emitted by the trees that were chopped down. An acre of rain-forest, if it is virgin forest (that is planted on land that has not being forested for over 100 years) absorbs about 135KG of CO2 per year.

Twenty acres of rain forest absorbs 80 tons of CO2 in a year - the amount of Co2 emitted from burning 8000 gallons of gasoline. Therefore 1 acre of rain forest would absorb 4 tons of CO2 in a year.

The Amazon rainforest absorbs 1.5 billion tons of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere every year.

Answer 2

Rainforests pull CO2 out of the atmosphere as foliage increases. The carbon is only temporarily sequestered in plant growth. When the plants die, that carbon is released. So if the forest expanse increases, CO2 levels fall. If the forest is slashed and burned for agriculture, atmospheric CO2 increases.

In ages past organisms might pull CO2 out of the atmosphere and permanently store it. Examples of this are the Permian and Carboniferous coal seams and oil fields, or the chalk and limestone deposits of the Cretaceous period. All this CO2 remained locked up in the coal and rock until humans began recognizing commercial value to it. We liberate CO2 from lime in the manufacture of cement, and billions of tons more from the consumption of fossil fuels.

Trees cut down for lumber used to build homes and offices continue to sequester the carbon they have pulled from the atmosphere. Rainforest trees are typically just die and rot or are burned in situ, so their carbon is not permanently sequestered.

Answer 3

According to a team of British and Brazilian scientists, writing in the journal Science, the Amazon rainforest absorbs 1.5 billion tons of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere every year.

However a severe drought in 2005 killed many trees, and now in 2010 another drought probably worse than the 2005 one means that with the huge number of trees dying, the Amazon will not be able to absorb its usual yearly amount in the future. Rotting trees will also release as much as 5 billion tons of CO2 in the coming years. That is almost as much carbon dioxide as the 5.4 billion tons the USA alone emitted from fossil fuel use in 2009.

Where is the Amazon carbon absorbed? It is absorbed into rainforest foliage and growth. So when the forest expands, atmospheric carbon declines. When the forest shrinks, CO2 levels rise. Human destruction of Amazon rainforest has slowed considerably in recent years, but it still continues. Overall, the rainforest does not permanently sequester carbon, the way Permian and Carboniferous coal seams and oil fields did, or Cretaceous chalk and limestone deposits.

Answer 4

About 1000 kg (2204.62262 lb) is absorbed by one average tree per year.

Answer 5

About 50% of a tree's weight is carbon which it has removed from the atmosphere.

Answer 6

50% of the dry weight of trees is carbon.

so about 50% of the biomass of trees on earth.

Answer 7

it removes 90%